It’s Sunday, Dean and I are sitting in the meadow watching 2 guys take their time on Sea of Dreams, and 2 other guys from YOSAR pushing on Lost in America. We were lucky enough to see the YOSAR guys on the crux pitch 8 about 20 or so hours into their push. In our original plan this’d be our first night on The Zodiac. Plans change. The original plan had Dean picking me up at the San Fran Airport, us blasting to the valley, hauling a load to the base, jetting down for some pizza, crashing at camp 4, hauling and fixing to 3 on Saturday, and blasting on Sunday. The original plan didn’t include us stopping at McDonald and Dean getting food sickness. He was pretty much shot, which was ok, as I got to get some shopping in, a few beers, and some quality people watching. Camp 4 was full so we drove back out to Hetch Hatchie (spelling?) to camp for the night. We decided against poaching a site, but did try in Yellow pines. Some knob from Chevron would have none of that. I’m sure that anal prick has no friends, none!

Sorry I got side tracked, back to Sunday in the Meadow. As a skinny woman rides up on a bike, both Dean and I recognize her as Lorna from a few of Holly’s TR’s. She is here to check on her pals on Lost in America. We chit chat for a bit,
she asks “What are you up to?”
We say “Zodiac”
“oh I want to do that one”
I say “I’m pretty psyched, this is my first wall”
Silence….. Crickets……
“So…you mean you’ve never done a wall?” Lorna inquires.
“Nope”

I opted not to tell her that I really only have about 20-30 short, 80’ or so, pitches of what I think might be C2. In truth/ retrospect it was more like C1. I also opt to not mention that I’ve never placed a piton, never placed an off set alien, and have never seen a pin scar. All of these things made me a little nervous, and I sort of didn’t want to see Lorna’s reaction. Dean has a bit more experience and had soloed Tangerine Trip, practiced on a bunch of lower pitches of El Cap routes, did the Prow, and I think the West Face of Leaning Tower.

An oft repeated quote of the trip was “So… you mean you’ve never done a wall?”

Back to the journey. Saturday had Dean and I Hauling a load to the base and me leading pitch 1 of 16. All in all I lead 1,3,5,6,8,10,12,14,and 16.

The climbing was pretty straight forward, off set aliens are almost like cheating, the top had me placing 2 or 3 cam hooks to the anchors. It took me 2.5 +/- hours, and was unquestionably the hardest aid pitch I’d climbed to date. But I had read somewhere that if you can climb pitch 1 of Zodiac, you can climb Zodiac. I’m feeling pretty good, until Dean tells me he saw C-Mac climb the first pitch in 12 minutes on YouTube. Dean cleans

And we decide that since he is still a little dehydrated we are better off going down instead of fixing to #2. I rap and access the damages of a bounce tested nut.

Off to the Pizza deck for a Hawaiian pizza and a beer. Camp in Camp 4.

Sunday gets us up and hauling another load, we jug, Dean leads pitch #2

I clean, it’s hot, and Dean is still so dehydrated that he has not peed yet. I vote we bag, hang in the meadow, get some pizza and a good night sleep. He agrees. We haul to #2 rap and head down. See above for Sunday afternoon.

Camp 4 was loud.

Monday morning, up and at em. Haul the last load, and blast. We jug to 2, I lead 3 with much more confidence than 1 until I had to hook about 20 feet to the right to get to the belay. I’m thinking C1 my ass this is gripping me. AHHHHH I clip the belay, that feels SOOOOOOO good. Dean says “you sure you’re at the belay?”. “Yeah,… ah shit” I now see the error of my ways as there is a nice C1 crack leading to a belay about 20’ of gripped hooking to my left. I sit there in the heat and get all worked up over nothing, then hook back to the route. This cost us some time.

Dean sets off on 4, it’s hot. I clean 4 and Dean says we could dock the gear, head down for some pizza, get 1 more gallon of water each, get up early and blast in the morning. I agree but change my mind about ½ way down the trail as I start thinking about jugging 400’ and where we’d be if we just kept climbing. Hind sight…

Great bivy, 5:15 start. Either my nerves are getting the better of me or I am dehydrated as I have a pretty bad gag reflex trying to eat a Cliff Bar. I chalk it up to dehydration. We Jug to 4. Actually this is Dean rapping from 4 the day before..

I head out on 5 and 6. Climb to the 5 anchors and back clean a piece or 2 pieces and head out on 6. Loose crap at the start but pretty straight forward. 1 inverted cam hook over a bolt felt pretty easy. USE SLINGS from 5 anchor to 6 anchor, I created some horrendous rope drag.

Now we’re in the meat of it. Dean gets the Black Tower.

I get pitch 8.

And take my first aid fall trying to speed things up on shallow cam hooks (over a good placement)

I fix the lines and rap back to 7 for the bivy. My first night on a wall!

Wednesday 5:15 I jug to the top of 8, set the haul, haul, get my ass back in the ledge while Dean leads 9.

Then Mr. ElCap pic showed up at the bridge to get some pics of Dean leading 9, me cleaning 9, me leading out on 10.

The nipple pitch was intense. I cam hooked out to a fixed nut, placed a lost arrow as the nut was suspect, cam hooked past 2 more fixed pieces to get me to the nipple. Above the nipple I used 2 beakes to get to the belay. For sure the hardest, headiest, pitch I’ve led.

Dean fired 11 and we bivied.

The next morning I led 12. 12 was nice but getting to the belay had me hooking for 6 moves above a bolt and some ledges. The hook were pretty enhanced though.

Dean on 13, me on 14, Dean sends 15. Apparently Tom Evans was heading out and shot a few last photos of us at 15…

Dean leading 15

By the time I get to 15 it’s 8 oclock-ish. I try to get Dean to lead 16 to the top, no deals. I consider it then keep remembering people saying it’s no give away etc. I tell you what, if you get there and it’s a relatively full moon and it’s 8:00 PM, send it, after what you did to get where you are it’s no big deal.

So Dean and I are spent, after dinner we decide to use 1 porta ledge and the natural ledge for the bivy. We only have 8 hours until we get up. Yeah, not a good plan. I think I slept for an hour that night..

FISH DOUBLE LEDGES SUCK

(NOTE THIS IS A FISH SINGLE LEDGE BEING USED AS A DOUBLE, THIS PRODUCT IS NOT INTENDED FOR DUAL USE. THIS FISH PRODUCT USED AS IT IS INTEDED TO BE USED DOES NOT SUCK AT ALL IT ACTUALLY ROCKS, but it does suck as a double ledge).

Pitch 16 took 45-50 minutes. The summit is awesome.

Summit photo

East ledges suck. 6.5 hours, and I took a good tumbler with the pig on my back. Dean said I looked like a slinky as the weight of the pack would accelerate my tumble, then slow it down, then speed it up. It’s amazing what I’ll do to entertain a pal.

Showers at housekeeping. Burgers, chicken wings, fries, and nachos at the Curry Grill. Sleep back at Hetch Hatchie. Saturday to Deans house in San Fran, a town with a lot of hills, and a 4th floor walk up. Taco’s for lunch Sushi and Ice Cream for dinner all with the lovely Tia, Deans wife. Sunday on a plane back to Michigan. Monday I get to see my sweets, Christa, and my dog, and her dog.

Killer!!!!!!!!!
1st wall as well, before then after the clean up. Your water bottle looks awefully small for summer. I barely had the energy to take pix(they were film then). What's next hard man ?
note; 1st time was pre cam hook and pre offset alien,adjustable aiders too. Way easier(cheating? the 2nd)

Good job,Guy(s)....That was my 1st El Cap route, too.....
You got some memories goin' for me.....Thanks.
WoooooHooooooo!
(Except we had the pleasure of seeing Dougald Macdoogal{Ronald Macdonald? that R&I guy} get pummeled in a storm because he came unprepared...
poor silly bastard!)
Groove on, Prod!